LIFE LESSONS

THROUGH LITERATURE
30 October 2023
Professor Goodwin
Hope, Optimism

According to the Cambridge Dictionary,

hope is “something good that you want to
happen in the future, or a confident
feeling about what will happen in the
future,” and optimism is “the quality of
being full of hope and emphasizing the
good parts of a situation, or a belief that
something good will happen.”
How people explain events
in their lives
 There are three facets of how people can explain a
situation. These can influence whether they lean toward
being optimists or pessimists:
 Stable vs. Unstable: Can time change things, or do things
stay the same regardless of time?
 Global vs. Local: Is a situation a reflection of just one part
of your life, or your life as a whole?
 Internal vs. External: Do you feel events are caused by you
or by an outside force?
The Optimism Test
 The U Penn Optimism Test by Dr Marty Seligman looks at three dimensions of optimism:
 Do you see bad events as permanent, or temporary? For example, if your romantic
partner breaks up with you, do you believe it’s because you’re unlovable or that no one
understands you (i.e. a permanent state)? Or do you believe that you two just weren’t a
good match (a temporary state)? What about if you win the lottery? In this case, if you
believe that you’re a lucky person (i.e. a permanent state), that’s optimistic compared
to someone who thinks that they just got lucky with those numbers.
 Are bad experiences specific, or do they affect all parts of your life (i.e. pervasive)? For
example, if you failed the math test, do you believe it’s because you’re not smart
enough (i.e. a pervasive state), or is it because you’re just not great at that subject (i.e.
specific)?
 When bad things happen, do you blame yourself, or the circumstances (personalized)?
 Pessimists tend to view bad events as permanent, pervasive, and personal. When these
habits are out of balance with optimistic thinking, our risk of experiencing depression
and anxiety is higher.
 https://kihc.ca/the-optimism-test/
Optimism as inherited trait
 Optimists believe wholeheartedly that things will work out, and when they
don’t work out, an optimist will learn from the experience to navigate a new
path. Pessimists tend to have less confidence and take failures personally. Any
setback can wound their self-esteem. They often rebound by assigning blame
to others.
 This recent Harvard study noted that being optimistic is in part an inherited
trait, and an earlier British study ascertained that about 25 percent of a
person’s mindset or predisposition for optimism is genetically inherited. That
allows for significant room to modify your mindset through behavioral
strategies. In short, the experts advocate for consciously changing your
mindset, and by doing so, changing your life.
 Psychology Today (July 2022)
Optimism is important because it can have a
significant impact on your mental and physical well-
being. Research has shown that an optimistic
worldview carries certain advantages, such as better
health, greater achievement, less stress, and greater
longevity.
It is also possible to develop learned optimism.
Pessimists can essentially learn to be optimists by
thinking about their reactions to adversity in a new
way and consciously challenge negative self-talk.
Pitfalls of Optimism
 Optimism is generally a positive characteristic that confers a number of physical
and mental health benefits. But this does not mean that is doesn't have a few
potential pitfalls. Some ways that optimism can be detrimental include:
 Optimism bias: Sometimes excessive optimism can lead people to overestimate
the likelihood that they can experience good things while avoiding bad things.
The optimism bias suggests that people often underestimate their risk of
experiencing negative outcomes. This can sometimes lead people to engage in
risky behaviors that actually increase their chances of having a bad outcome.
 Poor risk assessment: When people are overly optimistic about something, they
may be less likely to think about all of the potential risks and take steps to
mitigate those issues. This can ultimately make it more likely that their efforts
might fail, or at least run into major problems along the way.
 Toxic positivity: Sometimes people tend to overvalue positive feelings while
ignoring or even repressing negative ones. It can also cause people to invalidate
the emotional experiences of people who are going through difficult times.
 https://www.verywellmind.com/the-benefits-of-optimism-3144811
Pessimism About the Future May Lead to
Longer,
Healthier Life, Research Finds
 WASHINGTON—Older people who have low expectations for a satisfying future
may be more likely to live longer, healthier lives than those who see brighter
days ahead, according to new research published by the American
Psychological Association.
 "Our findings revealed that being overly optimistic in predicting a better
future was associated with a greater risk of disability and death within the
following decade," said lead author Frieder R. Lang, PhD, of the University of
Erlangen-Nuremberg in Germany. "Pessimism about the future may encourage
people to live more carefully, taking health and safety precautions." The
study was published online in the journal Psychology and Aging®.
Hope and Religion: Christianity
New International Version
And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.

New Living Translation

Three things will last forever—faith, hope, and love—and the greatest of these is love.

English Standard Version

So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.
Letter of St Paul to the Corinthians 1 Corinthians 13:13
Hope in Buddhism
 Hope is often tied into desire and craving, which Buddhists regard as a form
of suffering. Hope (for happiness) and fear (of suffering), fame and infamy,
praise and blame, gain and loss are the eight worldly dharmas—states of
mental grasping that keep us locked into deluded ways of being.

 Sister Clear Grace: In the Anguttara Nikaya 3:13, the Buddha teaches us
that there are three kinds of people in the world: “The hopeful, the hopeless,
and the one who has done away with hope.”
Is Hope Unimportant?
“For someone deeply involved in meditation and
concentrative states who has gone far on the path
of dharma, hope probably is not that important.
When we see that wisdom and joy are our natural
state, the clarity beneath our projections, and our
rich fundamental nature, there is no need to grasp
for something good coming in the future, because
we are already complete.” – Lion’s Roar Buddhist
website
Ernest Hemingway (1899-1961)

The American novelist and short-story writer,

awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1954.
He was noted both for the intense masculinity of
his writing and for his adventurous and widely
publicized life – as a war correspondent and
ambulance driver in WWI, for his four marriages,
and his big game hunting. His succinct and lucid
prose style exerted a powerful influence on
American and British fiction in the 20th century.
(Britannica)
The Old Man and the Sea
 The Old Man and the Sea was published in 1952 and
awarded the 1953 Pulitzer Prize for fiction. It is
considered one of the most accessible literary works of
20th century America, and is often assigned to high school
students. Significant themes include masculinity, the
complicated interaction of the human and natural worlds;
the importance of Perseverance and Hope; the value of
pride and respect; memory and the past.
Resources

 https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/03/well/mind/optimism-questions.html
 https://
www.authentichappiness.sas.upenn.edu/questionnaires/scores/results/12595
26/14678833/score
 https://www.lionsroar.com/ask-the-teachers-what-is-the-buddhist-view-of-ho
pe/#:~:text=Sister%20Clear%20Grace%3A%20In%20the,causes%2C%20conditions
%2C%20and%20context
.